The Weekender’s here with a vicious squirrel, ready to knock your socks off!

“I am James, prince of The Weekender and defender of the secrets of witty cultural humour. This is Liv, my fearless friend. Fabulous secret powers were revealed to me the day I held aloft my magic keyboard and said, “By the power of It’s Nice That! I have the power!” Liv became the mighty Laughter Cat, and I became Weekender-Man, the most powerful man in the universe! Only one other shares this secret — our friend, Rob Alderson, but he’s away in Turkey. Together we defend friday afternoon from the evil forces of boredom." And erm… that was how The Weekender was born. Or was that He-Man?

Tweet of the week

“Had an argument with my neighbour about my trees growing over his fence. Of course, when I extended the Olive Branch it only made it worse.”@Pundamentalism must be a hoot to live next to.

Social media is better than reality moment of the week

You know sometimes when you’ve just had the worst day EVERRRR and you really need a hug, but there’s nobody there to give you one and it makes you so so sad. Yeah well not anymore because, as with all good things in life, somebody’s created a robotic version in the form of a vest that offers a warm embrace every time somebody ‘likes’ you on Facebook. Sweet relief, we’ll never want for physical contact again!

Genius squirrel of the week

We’ve always been pretty keen on squirrels. Those cute little guys can do no wrong as far as we’re concerned. The combination of fluffy tail, tiny little arms, silky fur and large, vacant eyes is just too much to handle. Sometimes we’ll just sit in a park and watch them for hours. But their status as our favourite semi-rodent has been cemented after one of them attacked One Direction singer Niall Horan in Battersea Park this week. Go on my son!

Time wasted to impressive effect moment of the week

SERIOUSLY, how many hours must’ve been wasted to make this video possible? Who even cares, it’s amazing. We’re jealous.

Best crowd-sourcing of the week

Women of the world rejoice, the cryptic communications of those verbally challenged men in your life need no longer concern you. HeTexted is a brand new site that allows you to upload your man’s incomprehensible messages and have them translated by a panel of literate lads. Sass-tastic! (Cosmo, if you need me, I charge per word).

Earlier this week it was National Hot Dog Day, next week is National Salad Week and apparently in America the whole of July is National Ice Cream Month. Known for having a balanced and nutritious diet the Weekender is taking part in all of these food-related celebrations with gusto. A garden salad has accompanied every mustard drenched hotdog and a classic fruit cocktail has sat atop each trendy pot of artisan gelato. But it’s time for the Weekender to undo its top button and let the belly of art and design flop over the denim waistband of the creative industries. Enjoy! – Money is a web of difficult decisions for graduates starting out in the creative industries. Should you work for free? If so, when and why? If you shouldn’t, why not? We spoke to seasoned professionals to find out the deal with unpaid jobs, and, if you do decide to take them, how you can make them work in your favour. Spanish artist Yolanda Dominguez is back with a new project this week, and she doesn’t show any sign of abandoning her quest to probe the more problematic areas of the fashion industry. This time around she asks eight-year-old children to describe what they see in the ad campaigns of leading fashion houses, and their responses – occasionally funny, largely disconcerting – are a shock to the system.
– Offbeat filmmaking collective CANADA is back with an absolute treasure this week. Ouch! That’s Big is a new short created as part of a new series for Vogue video, and it’s all French new-wave cinema, 60s science fiction and Gucci. Needless to say, it’s well worth a watch.

It’s small, it’s wearing a shawl, it’s ready for a brawl – welcome to the Weekender, our weekly supplement of all the best stuff we’ve come across this week. Ready to see you through the weekend like an over-zealous, elderly tour-guide.– Last week we launched the first in our series of features helping grads find their feet. This week philanthropic old us is back with more, chatting with some of our many friends in high places to ask if (or when) you might need to get an agent.

Every year Wimbledon brings out the competitive side in the Weekender. There’s no humble nodding when there’s a bad serve, or quiet screech into the sweat towel when a point is lost. It’s full on racket-wrangling, ball-bouncing, giant-grunting when the Weekender is on centre court. But if you’d rather have a mellower Wimbledon final this weekend grab a jug of pimms, fill your gob with strawberries and read a friendly rally between art and design.– We’re not ones to blow our own trumpets at INT Towers but when it comes to advice we’ve got friends in fairly lofty places, so obviously we jump on any opportunity to rack their brains for advice. In part one of four articles designed to help new graduates get off on the right foot, we spoke to a couple of them about their tips on putting together portfolios. Share the love!

“Scorchio!” is the word of the week for the Weekender. It’s been a joy to have the sun beaming down on us so perpetually, and to avoid wishing that heat away the Weekender is adopting a sensible summer regimen to get through it. This includes a daily dose of ice cream of your choice, the right to say “God it’s hot!” up to eight times a day and a uniform of loose-fitting bits of material that we can get away with calling “clothes.” If you want the same prescription as the Weekender read on ahead and come see us after – we’ll be melting in the park dreaming of paddling pools.– One-of-a-kind photographer Juno Calypso’s new exhibition opens at London’s Flowers Gallery this week. This time around she spent a solo evening at the Honeymoon Hotel in Pennsylvania in the company of her alter ego, Joyce. The very best yet.

If the Weekender was to create a soundtrack it wouldn’t have any of those cool jams the kids listen to these days. It would be filled with the songs and artists that remind us of a time when you had to ring someone’s house phone to talk to them. With bangerz from Craig David, Blazin’ Squad and Billie Piper, it would be like an old episode of Top of the Pops, and then we’d all go out for a Pizza Hut buffet. So while the Weekender drifts off into a carb-fuelled, cheese-laden food coma, have a little peek at what we’ve been seeing and reading this week.– Excellently crafted animation Coda was the most read article on It’s Nice That this week, and with a host of awards, a focus on life and mortality, and a beautiful soundtrack, it’s little surprise. If you haven’t watched it yet, do: it will be the wisest nine minutes you spend all week.

If the Weekender were to contribute to the “lonely hearts” column in a crumpled, thoroughly thumbed tabloid, it would probably read “fun-loving, outgoing, heavily bearded older guy, WLTM likeminded pals for weird GIF exchanges, bad jokes, all-you-can-drink Bloody Mary brunches and all that accompanies them.” If that doesn’t sound like your cup of tea, you’re in the wrong place. Enjoy!– Oh M.I.A., audio-visual queen of our hearts, is there no wrong you can do? For the latest release from her new album Matangi, Maya teamed up with Gener8ion to film no fewer than 36,000 kids at China’s biggest fighting school performing a routine in staggering, faultless unison. Just try to look away.